Taking Sherlock out of Context
by FormerCircusTeapot
Summary: Silly and very slow moving. Set just after the great game. Sherlock escapes Moriarty with John. A little UST but I'm not sure how it will go yet. Based on the adventure of the speckled band. I own very little and make no profit.
1. Taking Sherlock out of London

"We best get going. How fast can you pack a suitcase?"

Sherlock's voice was too loud, still filled with nervous, restless energy which hadn't left him since the swimming pool. John hadn't the energy to be annoyed. His mind was clouded with a fug of exhaustion.

"What are you talking about? We're soaking. We've been through hell and back. Don't I get one good nights sleep?"

Sherlock paused for a second. He looked down at John's face, his eyes trying to re-align their frames of reference.

"Do you think he is just going to stop?" Sherlock's voice got louder. He paced about disarranging the flat, as if looking for something. John stood motionless, in the midst of this, dread seeping into his bones. The chlorinated water running from his hair to form a droplet on the end of his nose. "Pack your bag!" Sherlock was shouting now. John acquiesced silently and made his way upstairs.

When John came downstairs, his hair was towelled and was in dry clothes. He still smelt strongly of chlorine but he looked less like he had just swum in from a plane crash. Sherlock was waiting in the hall, coat and scarf on and a leather hold-all in his hand.

"You took your time." Sherlock spoke with and air of grievance.

"Sorry" John paused and stood in the hallway for a moment in silence.

"Put your coat on I've ordered a cab" Sherlock was shifting his weight from foot to foot, breathing heavily. His voice was calmer now.

"Where are we going?"

"To my parents," Sherlock coughed awkwardly. "Mycroft's idea. I hope you don't mind."

"No..." John's eyes flickered towards Sherlock's. They met. John's breath caught. There was something in Sherlock's expression that made John feel odd. "... I'm quite curious to be truthful."

John shrugged on a jacket and they walked downstairs. He wondered what Sherlock's parents would think when confronted with the two of them, exhausted and drenched in the exotic perfume of chlorine, dynamite and anxious sweat. Then again, they were Sherlock's and Mycroft's parent. They were probably used to it by now.

"Where do they live?"

"Mid-Wales" John had been picturing a stately home somewhere in the home-counties, Agatha Christie country.

The cab was waiting when they got downstairs. Sherlock directed it to Paddington.

"What's the time?"

John checked "Half four" he groaned internally "in the morning." somewhat superfluously.

"Good we can catch the first train." John groaned, out loud this time, and slumped down in his seat.

Almost an hour later, they were sitting in the, spookily empty, terminus at Paddington. Well, John was sitting. Sherlock was pacing. John felt rather serene in his haze of exhaustion.

"Its unlike you to be so nervous." He addressed his still pacing companion.

"Its not me he's going to hurt." This seemed an atypical line of though for a self-defined sociopath.

"I didn't think you cared...?"

"Neither did I." Sherlock's voice was quiet now, almost pensive. The slender detective sprang up suddenly. John's heart raced but he was glad to see some animation in his friend.

"The platforms up... lets go." and they were off, John almost jogging to make up for the discrepancy in leg length.

The train was eerily empty. The morning light shone golden into the carriages. They found a table. Sherlock looked strangely statuesque. His skin looked like marble with a gentle golden sheen. He stretched languidly with his long legs out on the opposite seat. John noticed he was wearing odd socks.

"I hate leaving London" said the worlds only consulting detective, "The provinces are so soulless."

"I take it you don't visit your folks often then."

"I'm better than Mycroft." John was struck by how pained his companion looked. "It doesn't suit his style. I just forget to remember."

"I would've thought it'd suit Mycroft, lording it over the Welsh peasantry and all."

Sherlock glanced at John and smirked. "You would have thought so. I think he finds mummy disturbing. He can't look after her."

Later they sat in silence in the near empty carriage. John could see the tension, which had tightened every muscle in the detectives face, slip away with every mile between them and Jim Moriarty's hunting ground. Whatever he might say, Sherlock did seem glad to leave London.

The taller man's eyes were closed and John had been shamelessly watching him sleep peacefully, when Sherlock spoke again.

"Thank you"

"Thank you? For what?"

"The stuff in the swimming pool and...for y'know sticking around."

John almost mentioned that he hadn't had much choice this time. He stopped himself feeling, perhaps, it wasn't the best thing for his companions sensibilities..

"Thank you" he said instead. Sherlock didn't ask him to clarify himself.

The trip by train was only a couple of hours and most of is was spent in an exhausted silence. Sherlock had walked up the carriage to call hiss brother and John stared out the window as they rushed past Reading. He continued to watch the country rushing past as Sherlock returned and the train passed Swindon then Bristol and then...

"We're here" said Sherlock and the alighted into the dilapidated Victorian vision which was Newport station. A shiny, black car met them out front. A driver, John was quietly impressed. It wasn't every flatmate who's parents had a chauffeur.

They talked even less in the car; partly due to the presence of the driver; partly because Sherlock seemed so unsettled. John thought his parents must be truly terrifying to elicit such emotions from his friend. A man, John mused, who had seemed fearless twenty-four hours ago and now seemed to posses a brooding anxiety.

John had been expecting a looming, black manse, so he was puzzled when the car stopped in a small, back-street. A row of neat terraced houses stretched in either direction and a track-suited man shuffled, smoking, along the other side of the street.

"We're here" said Sherlock again.

"Here?"

"Yes" he said simply but the corners of his mouth twitched. John grabbed his bag and followed Sherlock through an iron gate. His parents front yard was both untidy and bountiful. It was filled with bright flowers, though John only recognised geraniums, and tiny indian looking statuetes. The paths cracks were chocka with dandylions and there was a stained glass man-in-the-moon in the front door.

"Not what you expected?" said Sherlock the corners of his lips twitching.


	2. Taking Sherlock out of 221b

"You and Mycroft are so..." John gesticulated and then closed his eyes trying to find the right word "...well, posh." That came out wrong, John thought. "And what about the driver?" He said seizing tangible evidence for his assumptions.

"He was one of Mycroft's lot."

John flushed. He was bemusedly trying to picture Sherlock and Mycroft popping in and out of this idiosyncratic, little house.

"What do you parents do?" John realised he'd been assuming they were landed gentry. He desperately tried to readjust to Sherlock's new context.

"My mother is a primary school teacher and my fathers worked in a bicycle shop. He's retired now."

John laughed out loud. He couldn't stop himself. He was almost screaming and felt like his body was a conduit for all the emotions and anxiety he had repressed in the last few hours. He calmed down and realised he was gripping Sherlock's biceps. His friend looked puzzled. John gasped, wiped a tear from his eye and...

"...its just so normal. I'm disappointed in you really. And maybe a little hysterical" he added as an after thought.

Out of the moon adorned door and into the midst of John's maelstrom burst a tiny grey-haired lady in her middle age. She would have been the spit of Sherlock except for the difference in height and dress. She was wearing tangerine pantaloons.

"Sherlock!" she exclaimed, standing on tip-toes to get her arms around his neck. John was treated to a briefer embrace; about twelve kisses to each cheek; and a powerful waft of patchouli oil.

"So, are you here to 'meet the parents'?" John blushed and for once Sherlock beat him to "We're not a couple"

"Oh really?" His mother's tone almost seemed to imply disbelief. What was it, John mused, that caused every person they met to make that presumption? Bloody liberal society.

"Come in, come in" chirped Sherlock's mother. Despite her colourful attire she reminded John of a blackbird. It was something in her quick motherly movements and the way she cocked her head to the side examining the pair of them.

They followed the orange pantaloons into a cluttered, lime coloured corridor filled with boots, anoraks and piles of junk mail so high they looked like they had been begun before even Mycroft. John was struck by a thought.

"Sherlock" he hissed as they removed their shoes "what's your mother's name?"

"Nia" said both Holmes together "It means bright in Welsh" added the woman in question.

"Come and meet my husband" said Nia seizing John firmly by the forearm and whisking him into a small kitchen. The kitchen was dominated by the presence of Sherlock's father. "David" Sherlock supplied. He was huge. Not fat, but by no means slender and even sitting John could see he would stand well over six feet. His face was covered with an enormous, black, Victorian style beard. His skin was deep chestnut. John felt somehow that he was more a tree than a person. He was so large and seemed oddly magnetic. A force of nature rather than a fallible man. His stillness was quite different from Mycroft's cautious lethargy, somehow more primal.

The restless energy of John's flatmate was clearly inherited from his mother. Nia was almost skipping around the kitchen stirring pots of filling kettles and getting only partway through a task before feeling he urgency of another. Sherlock was rocking from foot to foot his big toe wiggling out from the hole in one grey sock. He looked oddly out of place.

As John was watching him Sherlock sprung into action.

"You'll be sleeping in Mycroft's room." he said seizing John's wrist so hard it was almost painful. "You can take your stuff up." John was practically dragged from the room; up a flight of stairs (magenta) to a landing with two blue doors painted with sunflowers and one with mermaids. Above them it said 'Sherlock', 'Mycroft' and 'Bathroom'. Sherlock dropped his bag outside his own door and went through 'Mycroft'. John followed.

The room inside was a testament to Mycroft's ambitions and struck an odd dichotomy with the rest of the house. All in dark wood with green leather upholstery, it looked more like the office of a cabinet minister than a bedroom.

"Spooky isn't it" said Sherlock. John grinned.

"Can I see yours" said John in a fit of, slightly impolite, curiosity. He had never had cause to go into Sherlock's room in the flat. "Leave your stuff then." said Sherlock simply.

Behind the 'Sherlock' door, the room was painted a vivid cerulean. This was not the décor John had expected, he suspected a mother's hand. The small aeroplanes and fire engines on the walls confirmed John's suspicions that it hadn't been redecorated for a score of years. Oddly the room felt like home. The place was littered with Sherlock's detritus: microscopes, forensic journals, pickled animal parts and an enormous collection of detective novels – from Agatha Christie to Georgette Heyer to Dorothy L Sayers.

"Reminds me of home" remarked John.

"No" Sherlock paused and looked about. "No BMJs, no cardigans, no skull, no gun."

John picked his way across the floor and Sherlock joined him. They sat on the bed. "I like the fire engines."

"You do? Mycroft tells me they're childish."

John chuckled. Sherlock still seemed tense holding himself stiffly. John ached to relax him, to reassure him somehow.

"The fireman..." Sherlock began "... were forerunners of the skull."

John grinned fully now. "So, I am in the glorious line, painted firemen, human skull, John Watson."

"You have other uses." said Sherlock smiling wickedly "they couldn't help me feed the chickens" and with that he sprung off the bed, knocking over a pile of foreign periodicals and bounded downstairs. John, still chuckling, followed at a more measured pace.


	3. Taking Sherlock out of his Greatcoat

Outside it was an overcast, heavy afternoon with a steady drizzle which made the garden look both more luscious and less inviting. John stopped at the threshold to gaze at the rather incongruous sight of Sherlock in an Anorak. Sherlock looked back round at him and jogged back inside.

"Do you have a raincoat?"

John shook his head and Sherlock surveyed the coats hanging on pegs around the doors.

"You better have dad's."

The coat came to John's knees. The corners of Sherlock's mouth twitched again.

The chickens were a motley crew. Two glossy hens and a huge cockerel lorded it over three featherless woebegone looking specimens that were being chased away every time they got near food or shelter. John could swear one gave him a long suffering look when the cockerel chased her from under the lip of the hen house.

"No feathers?" asked John

"They're rescued..." said Sherlock slightly rolling his eyes "...from battery farms."

"The eggs and the meat we eat are from creatures like that!" John felt nauseous.

"They're chickens." muttered Sherlock "they don't know they ought to be miserable. You're as sentimental as mummy."

One of the bald chickens took refuge between John' feet, sheltered by the tent-like quality of his borrowed coat. The healthy fowl eyed it suspiciously but seemed too nervous to approach.

"Where's the food?" said John after a moment. Sherlock's dreamy vacant expression melted.

"What? Oh, I'll get it. You protect the chicken."

So John was left standing in the drizzle, somewhere in the middle of Wales, his sole purpose to protect an ex-battery chicken. Sherlock returned moments later. He was carrying a large chipped mug filled with grain. He poured half of it by the coop and the other half between John's feet.

"How come you and Mycroft don't have accents?"

"It was an early manifestation of Mycroft's megalomania" Sherlock's eyes smiled "he taught himself to talk like we'd been to Eton, just before we started high school. I was quite posh anyway. Mum thought it was very peculiar. He used to sit in his room repeating the rain in Spain lies mainly on the plain and etcetera. John giggled despite himself.

When the rescue hens were finished eating they walked back inside. John could smell wet grass. Sherlock was almost dancing. Something had brought the spring back into his step. They walked through the French windows to peel of the anoraks. Sherlock threw himself onto the small sofa and began to throw a glass paper-weight up to the ceiling then catch it. John winced every time it began a decent, convinced it was about to land with a sickening thud on Sherlock's forehead.

"Don't do that." David said on entering the room. He had to duck to enter the door.

"Why not?" asked his son with a slightly petulant tone.

"Its killing John." Sherlock looked shocked

"He's paralysed by the conviction you're about to kill yourself."

Sherlock swung about to look at John who was frozen in anxiety. He laughed. David uprooted himself to plant himself in the chair by the fire. He looked so still. Sherlock called John over to sit on the sofa.

"I'm bored" Sherlock raked his hand through his hair. "Wales is so dull."

David grunted. He looked at Sherlock with a slightly withering expression. He didn't speak. Nia sprung in. She was carrying a tray with tea and mugs. She poured out mugs and took one to the only remaining chair. John looked around the room. It was homely with scrubbed oak floorboard. Less colourful than the rest of the house it was painted coral. There were throws over the sofa and intricate mirrored cushions scattered about.

"Sherlock is bored." said David.

"Well, if your bored..." said Nia "...you could come with me to school tomorrow. I'm worried about my teaching assistant."

Sherlock was still stretched out languidly, but he made a curious noise which prompted his mother to further exposition.

"She's about five years younger that you, Sherlock, and engaged." she shot him a slightly reproving look. Sherlock caught her eye and an annoyed look touched his face.

"What?" he cried "Why do you persecute me so?"

"I just worry about you boys. Neither of you attached. Aren't you lonely?"

"You were telling me..." said Sherlock "...about your teaching assistant."

He was doing a good job at feigning calm but John could see two spots of colour above each cheek bone.

"Her name is Helen Stoner. She lives up at Pwll-Mawr. Doctor Roylott's step-daughter."

"Roylott..." Sherlock looked upwards as if trying to divine something "...the guy with the cheetah?"

"That's him. He's a boor as far as I can tell. The girl has inherited money and they work. He scrounges off her. Apparently he tried to set up practice in London but it didn't take off. I don't know why she stands for it."

"So what's she worried about?" Sherlock was refusing resolutely to look interested. It made John laugh internally.

"I don't know"

"You don't know! There's nothing you don't know."

"That's why I need you to talk to her. I'm worried. She's out of sorts. Her twin sister died too years ago."

"Well, there is your explanation."

"No, there's more too it. I know, you should trust your mother."

"And you think I'll help?"

"Well you enjoy that kind of thing. You can take John. He seems trustworthy."

Sherlock laughed, quite unexpectedly. "I shall go." He looked at John. "John?"

"Oh, yes of course I'll come. Just explain to me one thing. You said something about a cheetah."


	4. Taking Sherlock out of New Scotland Yard

"The Cheetah..." said Sherlock portentously "is a pet. Beyond that I know almost nothing."

"You know who will know..." David spoke slowly, raising his bushy eyebrows.

"Yes" Nia drew the syllable out painfully slowly. She cocked her head at her son and once again reminded John powerfully of a blackbird. Her next phrase puzzled John. "You do need a haircut."

"A haircut?" echoed John

"The barber in town..." said David in his slow methodical way "...is a font of all knowledge."

"A bit of a gossip." Nia added

Sherlock snorted. He sprung to his feet in one fluid movement. David closed his eyes as if the show of activity pained him slightly.

"Lets go John."

The barbers was a tiny front room. Most of the space was taken up with three huge black Labradors. John choked slightly on their smell when he entered. He knelt on the floor to play with them craning his head back to avoid their over affectionate tongues. Sherlock craned his neck backwards as well almost mirroring John. He was avoiding the wet kiss of a tall, blonde woman.

"Hey Sherlock," she had a voice which screamed 20 a day "Who's your young man? You here for a trim."

"Not his young man, I'm John." He was seized by the lady and treated to a smacking kiss on his forehead and sat in a padded chair in front of a large mirror.

"Just neaten it up a bit"

"Yes" Sherlock was camping it up a bit. He played his long white fingers on the top John's head. "A bit shorter at the back I think."

John groaned, he would be amazed if anyone thought he was straight by the end of this.

"Ange..." Sherlock drawled "I was wondering if you had the latest gossip on our local eccentric?"

"Which one?"

John laughed, but it was cut off as Ange clicked on the trimmer. He felt the muscles down his back quiver as he saw the scene unfolding in the mirror. A meaty blonde woman held an electric hair trimmer. Behind her loomed Sherlock smiling serenely.

"Dr Roylott, the man with the cheetah."

"Oh 'im and a baboon."

"A baboon?"

"A baboon."

"He has a baboon as well as a cheetah. They're pets brought them back from somewhere he was living."

"Where?" Sherlock's voice was sharpened now by the thrill of an investigation.

"India. That's where he met the girls mother. At least according to Mr Falintosh. He doing some restoration up at Pwll-Mawr."

Ange pushed the trimmer upwards and John closed his eyes. He hoped Sherlock was getting the information he wanted. John didn't trust barbers.

"It is a sad story really..." continued Ange getting into full flow. "...the girls mother was a soldier, her husband as well. He was killed somewhere out east, and Dr Roylott picked her up in India. Poor, woman he's a terrible man really. He killed a man out in India, or so they say."

"Killed a man?"

"Yes, I think he was drunk or just mad. Got into a fight with a guy in Calcutta. Smashed his skull in. I think he got off somehow but he had to leave India. I think its made it hard for him to get work as a doctor as well."

Ange paused to brush the cut hair from John's neck. He looked in the mirror and was relieved to see that his hair looked much the same as usual.

"You're done young man that'll be a fiver."

John got out his wallet and Sherlock shot him an anxious look.

"What about the sister?" said Sherlock.

"Poor soul..." Ange let a canny look cross her features. "...well lads, I can't stand here talking. Work to do."

John almost laughed out loud to see the cogs of Sherlock's brain play out on his face. Sherlock was such a dandy. John could imagine he spent foul amounts of money on his hair. Now he was here being forced, despite his great intellect, into a five pound haircut just for information. With a sigh he sat in the chair.

"Well, the sisters a sorry story." Ange was grinning with glee. "she'd managed to fly the nest. Found herself a young man. They had one of those silly wills that you only find in murder mysteries. The girls had none of their inheritance until they were 30 or married. She was back for a while, to settle things with her family, when it happened."

"What happened?" Sherlock twisted his head around to meet her eyes. Ange calmly placed a palm on either side of her head and twisted it back.

"She died, some kind of seizure, bashed her head in on her iron bedstead. Horrible for her sister."

Ange was about to begin on Sherlock with the trimmer. He stood up and with a flourish produced a five pound not from his wallet and walked out even more briskly than was usual. John followed grinning apologetically at Ange who stood in petrified outrage still holding the trimmer aloft.


End file.
